Anchor texts for a wider long tail and more traffic

[HiramKey]

Let’s suppose we would like to rank for the widest long tail of the keyword “Widget London”
And let’s say we have a landing page well optimized for the root terms.

So same page, but different link building scenarios,
Which of the following linking scenarios would better help in your opinion?

SCENARIO 1 - 50 Links
50 links with the anchor “Widget London”

SCENARIO 2 - 50 Links
30 links with the anchor “Widget London”
10 links with the anchor “Widget”
10 links with the anchor “London”

SCENARIO 3 - 50 Links
10 links with the anchor “white widget London”
10 links with the anchor “black widget London”
10 links with the anchor “blue widget London”
10 links with the anchor “green widget London”
10 links with the anchor “red widget London”

Which scenario in your opinion will drive more traffic?

[mgreener]

Hi,

Usually the higher that you rank for the main keyword, the more longtail terms you will rank as well if your on page is setup right.

So either scenario 1 or 2.

[dburk]

Hi HiramKey,

It isn't quite as simply as counting the number of links to a given keyword.

First, ever backlink will have potentially very different value, based on the PageRank, TrustRank, Anchortext relevance, and the number of OBLs on the same page.

Second, each keyword you are potentially targeting will have different values based on the commercial intent, search volume, competition level, and how well targeted it is to your offer.

All things being equal, you will have faster results by focusing on fewer keywords until you get top rankings for those keywords. It doesn't help much to have 5 keywords each ranking on page 3 of search results, while a single top page listing on a single keyword will typically bring in far more traffic, assuming the same traffic volume for all keywords.

Having said that, there is nothing wrong with test targeting many different keywords, with minimal effort on each, to see which appears easiest to target in the next phase of your marketing efforts.

Say for example, you spread your targeting across many different keywords and then selected the one that is closest to a first page ranking and then pour everything into that single keyword util you reach that first page of SERPs. Then rinse and repeat.